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Day 59https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/26/day-59/
https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/26/day-59/#commentsTue, 26 Jul 2011 19:58:26 +0000http://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/?p=286Continue reading →]]>Kinda a meh day. My morning kid canceled so that was nice. I slept in and then watched “Breaking Bad” which was good as always. Then I tried to find someone to go to the Sox game with me. To no avail. Then I took Jack to the Barnes and Noble and we listened to music. Came home…pondered going to the Sox game alone…then ate the tickets. Drank on the balcony instead. So much for summer spontaneity. So it goes…

Woke up way too late. Clouds go away. Sit outside and drink a beer and more beers.

After beers and outside and Cubs win. My friends came. They drove to Chicago. We went and had some saucy Thai food at a Thai restaurant. The Thai restaurant was BYOB so we BOOB. It was warm. But it worked. Then we went into Wicker Park Festival. Brought beer again. I finished 80% of a Foster’s tall boy before security caught me. Handed him the empty bottle. Got on with evening. Saw Blitzen Trapper. So so good.

]]>https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/26/day-58/feed/1kerouaccatDay 57https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/25/day-57/
https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/25/day-57/#commentsMon, 25 Jul 2011 17:08:22 +0000http://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/?p=282Continue reading →]]>Day 57 was Sabbath and I went to church at Hinsdale. I hadn’t been there in a minute. I have to say that after a week of isolation I was actually quite looking forward to going to church. And it was….pretty awful. I usually end up texting with Paul during church and from our conversations I have noticed a trend that church has just gotten absurd….I don’t mean bad necessarily, just sort of batshit crazy. I’ve been telling Paul that I’m about to start going to church on drugs and see what happens cause it’s gotten that weird. Here are some examples from both Paul’s church and mine over the last several weeks and months:

– Burr Ridge: The children’s story was nothing but a ten minute summary of The Sandlot, complete with real names and quotes. At the end the lady asked the kid who knew the moral of the story, claiming that if they had been listening it should be obvious. When greeted with silence she continued to nudge them along until one brave kid was like, “Obey your parents?” And then the lady goes “THAT’S RIGHT! go back to your seats.”

– Hinsdale: Our pastor has a propensity to say really inappropriate things in the pulpit. Two examples. “I was driving along the highway and I passed a cop and….he fingered me!” “For communion today we have a special room set up downstairs for men who wish to service other men.” He is a religious Tobias Funke.

– Gainesville: The head elder said there will be no “beer parlors” in heaven.

– Gainesville: “Dude…we are having special music…synth keyboard…80s beat….ABOUT CHRISTMAS.” Message from Paul on June 18.

So the weirdest thing that happened this week was just that the closing prayer lasted TEN FUCKING MINUTES. You know how the closing prayer is usually just, “Go now into the world in the grace of God.” Not this week. It started like a regular prayer, then two pastors were there at once and they took turns praying for the next ten minutes. It was like this….one of them would pray for all the youth leaders, then the other would pray for the grounds crew, then the other would pray for the janitors, and on and on. It was ridiculous.

After church I went to Olive Garden with my cousins. I love Olive Garden, mostly for minestrone and breadsticks. After I was done eating decided I may as well go to BWW and play some trivia on a Sabbath afternoon. So I did….first game I scored a 6666! No lie…then I decided may as well bring the party home so I got me some beer and I sat out on my balcony till it got dark outside and read this book called The Hole in Our Gospel. Then my friends Phil and Laura wanted to watch Wayne’s World so they came over and brought Whole Foods and more beer and we watched that and Chappelle’s Block Party. Druuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuunk

]]>https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/25/day-57/feed/1kerouaccatDay 56https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/24/day-56/
https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/24/day-56/#commentsSun, 24 Jul 2011 16:31:59 +0000http://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/?p=280Continue reading →]]>I didn’t get up till about 10 on Friday which was especially frustrating since I went to bed at like 11:30. I did wake up at some point in the night and couldn’t sleep so I moved to the couch and was out cold till I woke up at 10. Meh. I hate sleeping that long.

So I got up and watched “Fresh Prince”. I talked to my mom who made her daily morning call (not to be confused with the daily afternoon call, daily evening call, or random calls when she actually has something to talk about.) Then I watched Obama’s town hall meeting. A little while before eleven I started really hating the prospect of another summer day sitting and watching TV and doing little else. So I said fuck it and went to the Cubs game. It turned out to be a nice day…not brutally hot like the day before. The Cubs won 4-2.

At night I did nothing.

]]>https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/24/day-56/feed/2kerouaccatDay 55https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/23/day-55/
https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/23/day-55/#commentsSat, 23 Jul 2011 04:10:13 +0000http://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/?p=277Continue reading →]]>I still haven’t had a chance to talk about “Friday Night Lights”. (This is total bullshit…I’ve had plenty of chances to talk about “FNL”. I haven’t done a damn thing all week.) I’ll keep it short. I really liked the finale. They tied everything together very nicely. In fact, I almost felt like they tied it together TOO nicely. But in the end it really was a show where I appreciated happy endings since I love the characters so much.

Other TV related news…I’ve been watching a shit ton of TV as it’s been 120 fucking degrees outside. “Breaking Bad” was absolutely stellar. That show just gets better and better.

I also watched that movie “Cedar Rapids”. It’s funny but not side splittingly so. I appreciated the theme, especially given recent family developments involving both Cedar Rapids and insurance sales.

It’s so silly that I’m just now finding out about a rapper with a song called “Kush and Corinthians”. But then again…I just figured out THIS Phife Dawg song exists:

I knew Phife had some Adventist connections but I didn’t know he had a full verse about them. Or that that verse was so hilarious.

]]>https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/21/day-54/feed/1kerouaccatDay 53https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/20/day-53/
https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/20/day-53/#commentsWed, 20 Jul 2011 19:14:58 +0000http://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/?p=272Continue reading →]]>I had a day off Tuesday so I went and ate lunch with Erica…she said she was never going to see me again and I proved her wrong. Erica wanted to go to Nikki’s….I think this seems logical because “Nikki” and “Slikkers” are the only double K words I can think of off the top of my head. Plus the food is good and cheap. We had a talk about blankets that was pretty much the highlight of my week so far.

After lunch I went to several beaches. I pondered doing a few things like driving up to Holland to see Adam but I didn’t. I just drove up the coast to a beach called…shit, I can’t remember but it was really small and there weren’t many people and the sun was out and it was nice. Unfortunately, there was nowhere for me to put on a swimsuit so I didn’t stay there too long. I went and bought blueberries and beer instead. Then I went to Weko and drank three beers and listened to Jens Lekman. Unfortunately, it was so foggy I couldn’t see the water. Also there seemed to be a lot of douchebags with barbed wire tattoos…you know the type. But it was still a nice alone time at the beach. Then I left and drove home the long way.

When I got home “Superbad” was on tv. Yay. I love that movie but my high school experience was NOTHING like that.

“And Lot’s wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human.
So she was turned into a pillar of salt. So it goes.” -Vonnegut

Which I love…but then I found this one:

“It is this temperamental failure to understand Sodom in its own context, as an ancient metropolis of the Near East, as a site of sophisticated, even decadent delights and hyper-civilized beauties, that results in the commentator’s inability to see the true meaning of the two crucial elements of this story: the angel’s command to Lot’s family not to turn and look back at the city they are fleeing, and the transformation of Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt. For if you see Sodom as beautiful -which it will seem to be all the more so, no doubt, for having to be abandoned and lost forever, precisely the way in which, say, relatives who are dead are always somehow more beautiful and good than those who still live- then it seems clear that Lot and his family are commanded not to look back at it not as a punishment, but for a practical reason: because regret for what we have lost, for the pasts we have to abandon, often poisons any attempts to make a new life, which is what Lot and his family now must do, as Noah and his family once had to do, as indeed all those who survive awful annihilations must somehow do. This explanation, in turn, helps explain the form that the punishment of Lot’s wife took- if indeed it was a punishment to begin with, which I personally do not believe it was, since to me it seems far more like a natural process, the inevitable outcome of her character. For those who are compelled by their natures always to be looking back at what has been, rather than forward into the future, the great danger is tears, the unstoppable weeping that the Greeks, if not the author of Genesis, knew was not only a pain but a narcotic pleasure, too: a mournful contemplation so flawless, so crystalline, that it can, in the end, immobilize you.” -Daniel Mendelsohn

Waking up on Sunday morning was a challenge. I’m not really sure what time I finally staggered out of bed. I do know that I couldn’t get the damn paint off me. We left at about 11:30.

Sunday was hot and it seemed like it would be an excellent day to not drink. For a while I kept that up. They reduced the price of water to one dollar which was very nice. And I ate a BUNCH of food. Then I listened to Fresh and Onlys from the shade. They were ok. So was Yuck, even though they have a terrible band name and horrid cover art. Did I go see someone over at the side stage? The hell if I remember…

One of Sunday’s most anticipated sets was Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All. There was a pretty big deal made about the supposed protesters who planned on showing up to make it known they didn’t agree with much hyped rap collective’s extreme lyrics. I never saw any protesters. They must have realized how stupid protesting OFWGKTA would be….seeing them live really drives it home just how over-the-top absurd their lyrics truly are. I’m amazed that anyone could possibly take them seriously enough to go out of their way to protest. I completely understand people not wanting to subject themselves to it…I prefer not to listen to them for too long, not because I think they are contributing to violent behavior, but because I can only take that level of nihilism for so long. I’ve been meaning to write a little more about OFWGKTA – since, you know, that’s what everyone is doing these days – but that will be a different day. The show was pretty fun…not quite as bonkers as I was expecting, partially because Tyler the Creator was in a cast and actually sat down for much of the set. Then he crowd surfed in his cast and lost part of it. Kill people. Burn shit. Fuck school. The end. SWAG!

After Odd Future I went and checked out a little of Shabazz Palaces. They sounded pretty good but after standing in the sun for well over an hour at Odd Future I really couldn’t take the heat anymore so I did the very last thing I’d planned on doing…put myself in a place where I could hear Ariel Pink. Ariel Pink is fucking awful. But back at camp I was far enough away that it wasn’t TOO bad. I sat in a chair. I think I may have slept a little…mostly I just spaced out (thanks to some generous friends for that…hehehe.)

Then we went over to the side stage for Kylesa. The break time reenergized me a bit and I decided it was a good time to start drinking. Then Kylesa completely wrecked shit on stage. Easily the best set of the weekend to that point. I don’t listen to a ton of metal but it’s always fun at a festival and Kylesa is probably the best live metal band I have seen. And what better time for a DANCE OFF!!! Cause that’s how we do.

Went back and sat in the shade. Listened to Deerhunter from afar. Drank. Then moved up and got a great spot for Cut Copy. They didn’t disappoint at all. Complete dance party, particularly “Lights and Music”. The only disappointing thing was the lack of “Out There On The Ice”, which is pretty much my favorite song, but they ran out of time.

TV on the Radio was the headliner. I like TV on the Radio a lot but I still just stayed and watched from camp. I was done with the crowd. And more than that I decided I’d rather take the final ninety minutes of the fest to spend with people I like and don’t get to see very often.

Then…home. Laura and Phil came over and watched My Morning Jacket “Storytellers”. Then I was tired and drunk and done being social for a while so I went to bed.

I like Pitchfork. Sunday was a real good day of music but overall I definitely saw fewer “good” sets than I ever have…but it was still lots of fun.

]]>https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/19/day-51/feed/2kerouaccatDay 50https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/18/day-50/
https://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/2011/07/18/day-50/#commentsMon, 18 Jul 2011 23:56:48 +0000http://kerouaccat.wordpress.com/?p=262Continue reading →]]>Saturday of Pitchfork. I got up earlyish but didn’t go to church. But I did read my Sabbath School lesson. It was really boring. For Day 52 I will write a catch-all blog about some of the non-Pitchfork related things this weekend and I’ll talk more about this AND more about “Friday Night Lights”, which I watched during breakfast. I also watched some of the T.I. “Storytellers”.

On Friday I drove to Pitchfork and on Saturday I didn’t have to cause I rode with my friend Laura who picked me up a little after 12:30. We ended up getting there around 1:45 when Woods was just getting started. We headed to camp to find everyone who was already there and it was VERY quickly a party. Listened to Woods and Cold Cave from camp. They each sounded pretty decent. I’m just sorta beyond the point of going to stand in the sun and get a good spot for bands I’m not that familiar with. I would rather just hang out in the shade and drink and chat.

When I did get up and move it was to see G-Side on the side stage. There was hardly anyone there so we walked right up front. They were good but not entirely exciting. I can’t think of any interesting anecdotes from the show.

And then there was lots of down time for laughter and eating and drinking and other things. At some point I decided face paint would be a good idea. That got a little messy. No Age and Dismemberment Plan were the bands playing at this point that we could hear. I went close for DJ Shadow for a little while and he was disappointing. He performed inside an egg which was kind of weird…probably would have been cooler if it had been darker. Also I started feeling sorta shitty at this time and I went back to camp. Then I felt better.

Fleet Foxes had an enormous crowd. Apparently they are extremely popular now…I had no idea. They were kind of ok…kind of boring…would probably prefer them if they weren’t a headliner.